Notes and Editorial Reviews

Unless you are a devotee of Franz Schmidt, you are going to
need patience to get anything from this recording. But patience
will be rewarded, as there is a great deal of beautiful music
here. It is just that the pace of the various musical arguments
tends towards the geological. Schmidt was briefly a pupil of
Bruckner, and his conception of musical scale owes much to that
great predecessor. These quartets also show a fidelity to early
musical forms, especially those of baroque counterpoint, which
may also call Bruckner to mind.

Read more This is music of a later age, the two quartets were written
in 1925 and 1929 respectively, so any 19th century
precedents (Brahms is another) are going to be remote. Reger
is often cited as a kindred spirit, but this music is much less
congested than Reger’s, less angsty. Elgar’s contemporaneous
late chamber music would be a better comparison, or Delius perhaps.
Schmidt remained a melodist to the end. And why not? Melody
is probably his greatest strength. Both of these works, and
the first in particular, unfold though long, arching melodies.
A motivic structure is sometimes apparent, the falling fifth
throughout the first movement of the First Quartet, for example,
but development never means fragmentation. Movements tend to
venture into remote tonalities as they progress, but the long,
linear melodies remain.

Unswerving loyalty to formal archetypes is both a strength and
a weakness in this music. Both works are long, and the material
justifies the duration, but only just. The long melodic lines
need space to breathe, of course, but there is a sense of formal
functionality about virtually every section. In general, the
formal skeleton of the First Quartet is more apparent than that
of the Second, where intentions and directions are slightly
more veiled. But extended sectional repeats are the rule rather
than the exception. In the second movement of the First Quartet,
for example, the music moves from a Schubertesque opening to
neo-baroque contrapuntal second subject. Both are very elegant,
and the stylistic contrast is fascinating, but it is easy to
find yourself thinking too hard about these things as the two
sections are given lengthy repeats without any added interest.

The one structural commitment that Schmidt takes refreshingly
lightly is closure. Endings are never abrupt, but none are drawn
our either. The third and fourth movements of the Second Quartet
both end in satisfyingly efficient ways. The scherzo ending
is particularly impressive, the music rapidly drying up and
concluding with an ascent through the harmonics on a violin
string.

The performances by the Franz Schubert Quartett Wien seem very
much in the spirit of the music. Melodies are allowed to flow,
to meander through development sections, but to conclude with
the curt precision of Schmidt’s cadences. Much of the music
emphasises the middle register, high cello, low violins and
prominent viola. The sound in these sections is rich and satisfying,
and the individual identity of each player is never compromised
by the narrow tessitura. When the violins play higher, the sound
can become a little constricted. The problem may be with the
recording, or even with the scoring, but not with the intonation
or ensemble, which are excellent throughout.

This is a CD of long, substantial works by a composer who seems
destined to always command greater respect in his homeland than
abroad. My earlier comparison with Elgar – and they do sound
very similar – suggests such national distinctions are musically
arbitrary, and non-Austrian audiences should find just as much
to interest them from this, the work of a composer who is always
astute to his craft, occasionally intense, but never concise.
-- Gavin Dixon, MusicWeb International Read less